Craig Whitfield spent years in restaurant dining rooms and bars. Not as a customer, however. As an investigator.In the 10 years he worked as director of safety and security for one of the nation’s largest restaurant franchise companies, the Mishawaka native watched bartenders pocket profits and servers help themselves to more than their tips.

He saw servers delete entire meals from point-of-sales systems and pocket the money. He caught a bartender who had stolen $40,000 from a restaurant over five years by not always ringing in what customers had ordered to drink.

He describes helping Ohio police arrest a waitress at a national chain restaurant after she admitted to inflating her tips on credit card transactions several years ago. She stole more than $200 over five months from customers, including Whitfield when he posed as a customer and she doubled her $3 tip on his credit card.

“Most restaurant employees are honest, hardworking people. Unfortunately, the dishonest employees cast a bad light on the good ones,” Whitfield says. “When they get greedy, that’s when they hit the radar.”Employee theft costs U.S. restaurants 4 to 5 percent in sales each year. The National Restaurant Association estimates that employee theft accounts for 75 percent of a restaurant’s inventory losses.“With a million restaurants and bars across the country,” he says, “this loss is enormous.”

And the problem does not center around one brand or concept. It can affect any restaurant, anywhere, family owned or chain, 50 seats or 250 seats.“Yes, it even happens here. We have a lot of restaurants,” Whitfield says. “It’s an industry where there’s easy access to cash, and thieves are thieves, no matter the restaurant.”Whitfield has worked in law enforcement for most of his life. He spent 25 years with the Mishawaka Police Department working as an investigator. Not long after he retired, he decided to join the Memorial Hospital police department, where he currently serves as assistant chief.

He draws on a decade of experience investigating internal theft at restaurants in his book, “Guess Who’s Eating Your Profits: The Manager’s Essential Guide to Restaurant and Bar Loss Prevention and Investigations.” The book serves as a guide to restaurateurs, offering advice about how to identify, investigate and prosecute employees who might be stealing from their business.“So many mom-and-pop restaurants and shops go under,” he says, “and the ones that do, often have theft going on in some fashion.”

His own mother and father, who owned the G & L Diner in the mid-’80s at the corner of Mishawaka Avenue and Division Street in Mishawaka, caught a server stealing from them.“She was throwing the meal ticket away and pocketing the money,” he remembers. “I learned that just because the person is your friend, and they treat you nice, you can’t close your eyes to the fact that if your numbers are off, someone might be stealing from you.”

Cases of restaurant theft don’t always make newspaper headlines, because restaurateurs often try to deal with the situation in-house.“But if you’re not wise to all the ways there are to steal, and you don’t know how to push back on an employee who denies wrongdoing, you’re set up for a tough investigation on your own,” he says.In some cases, the crime can even affect restaurant diners who hand their server a credit or debit card. Whitfield offers consumers this advice:

• Protect your credit card. If it is taken from the table to complete the transaction, make sure the server returns your card. Sometimes a card can be swapped with a lookalike, which is usually a card left behind by another guest and was subsequently canceled,• Track your dining purchases. Keep your receipts. Leaving a receipt behind sends a message to the server that you really don’t care. Your copy serves as a reminder to check the transaction against your bank draw. You can confirm the amount is what you actually authorized.• Speak to a manager when you discover irregularities on your check.“Guess Who’s Eating Your Profits...” is available at Barnes & Noble book sellers and Amazon. Hardcover costs $28.95 and softcover is $19.95.

She asked the Agent if they were ready to place their order and the Agent placed one with her.

She did not make any suggestions or mention any menu items by name.

The Agent asked her opinion about some of the menu items but she seemed to be quite picky saying that she had not tried many items since she did not like them.

The Agent’s food was delivered by Theron and Xxxxx did not check back for quite some time. The Agent informed Theron of an issue with their food which he fixed promptly. Xxxxx did not even seem to notice or say anything about the issue.

She seemed to be very overwhelmed and not to be smiling or very friendly.

She did not give the Agent any silverware and they had to flag her down to ask for some.She appeared to forget and the Agent had to flag her down and ask again.

She took a short while to come clear once the Agent was done and she did not offer refills for a very long time despite the Agent’s glass being empty.

She did not offer dessert and came to offer the Agent the bill a very long time after they were done eating and drinking.

Once the bill was served payment was processed quickly.

The Agent would like to note that they were only charged for 2 of the 3 drinks they had ordered.

Xxxxx was observed to be pouring a 5 count White Russian with a 3 count of vanilla vodka and a 2 count of Kahlua.

On one occasion the Agent overheard a patron asking Xxxxx if their drink was a double. She said she had made the drink a double and put an extra shot in the extra blended drink portion. She told the patron that their drink in fact had 3 shots in it and he seemed happy.

Xxxxx was observed to be texting on her phone behind the bar.

Xxxxx was observed to be bringing glassware to the bar and holding the glasses with her fingers in the cup.

She was observed to be doing dishes.

On one occasion she was observed to be pouring a 3 count.

Xxxxx was observed to be doing dishes.

All of the bartenders were observed to be using an ice scoop.

The Agent observed Xxxxx to be working alone behind the bar for the majority of their stay and they wonder if Xxxxx and Xxxxx were actually servers.

A receipt was not observed to be placed in front of bar patrons after each round.

The Agent did not observe any patrons being ID’d.

The Agent observed multiple patrons to be ordering drinks and taking them away from the bar.

The Agent did not observe any children consuming alcohol but it would have been very easy for a patron to buy a minor a drink and give it to them outside of the bar..

Ohhhh lovely December. The season of thieving dishonest bartenders and restaurant servers comes to its peak. The amount of theft happening in the hospitality industry soars 400% late November and December. Friends, watch your credit card statements as bartenders and servers do this all the time when they feel pressured to make holiday money. Greedy jerks weren’t happy with a big 25% holiday tip and had to add another unauthorized 20% tip on top. Friggin’ thieves.

“Agent paid the bill with a credit card, left the slip blank except for Agent’s signature, and placed a $10 bill down with the credit receipt. On 12/3, Agent confirmed that the total charged was $48.61. Obviously, someone behind the bar had added an $8 tip on to the bill without authorization.

On 12/3, the POS transaction cleared Agent’s bank account. An unauthorized additional $8 tip had been added to the credit card charge by the bartenders. This also constitutes credit card fraud. These bartenders received a total of $18 in gratuity on a $40 bill. This is a blatant theft integrity issue that should be addressed immediately as one can interpolate that if they are stealing from a bar theft agent, then they most likely are doing it quite often with other guests.”

There were three bartenders that will be denoted as bartenders A, B, and C.Bartender A was a female Caucasian with long blonde hair wearing a low cut Xxxxxxxxx tank.Bartender B was a Caucasian male with a tall Mohawk haircut with blonde tips.He was unshaven, but did not wear a beard.Bartender C was a bulky Caucasian male with spiky blonde hair in somewhat of a faux-hawk style.

When this agent arrived in the bar, the rail was relatively full with a group of what appeared to be regular female patrons.The first impression that this agent had of this bar was Bartender C taking Bacardi 151 directly from the service pour spout into his mouth and spewing fire behind the bar as he lit the 151 he was expelling from his mouth.The violations, health infractions, and liabilities are numerous on this one initial impression.This agent will leave it to the managers and owners of Xxxxxxxxx if they want to continue with this type of activity.This agent would strongly recommend that this be discontinued immediately.

Bartender A was the first bartender to approach this agent on the bar top.She mentioned the specials for the night and mentioned that Miller Light bottles were on sale for $2.The agent opted to start the night with this.This female bartender immediately rang the drink through the POS and the screen notated the $2 charge.Change was returned immediately and there were no issues with this transaction.

At 1015pm the bar really began to fill up.Multiple groups came in through the front doors and began to gather and order from the bar.From 1015 until after 1115, this agent sat near where Bartender C was working.This was the middle well.

This agent counted 5 NO SALE deposits from drinks that were paid for in cash over this well.The bartender would approach the terminal with the money, simply hit the NO SALE key, which would flash across the POS and deposit the money directly into his drawer.This was so brazen that there wasn’t even an attempt to shadow the terminal or hide it.

Literally, the only drinks that were actually run through the POS system were those drinks where a credit card transaction was needed.Unfortunately on this night, this terminal was heavy on cash transactions and light on credit.The bottom line is that if a report were run during the middle of this shift, Bartender C’s drawer would be found way over.

In addition to this, Bartender C was also seen giving an unrung long neck over the bar with a thumbs up to a male patron, which is a violation of liquor ordinance concerning free alcohol as well as a bartender theft loss to the club.

TITLE 4, CHAPTER 3

4-242. Sale of liquor on credit prohibited; exceptions

It is unlawful for a licensee, or an employee or agent of a licensee, to sell or offer to sell, directly or indirectly, or to sanction the sale on credit of spirituous liquor, or to give, lend or advance money or anything of value for the purpose of purchasing or bartering for spirituous liquor, except that sales of spirituous liquor consumed on the licensed premises may be included on bills rendered to registered guests in hotels and motels, and spirituous liquor sales for on or off premises consumption may be made with credit cards approved by the director, and sales of spirituous liquor consumed on the premises of private clubs may be included on bills rendered to bona fide members.

Half way through this evaluation, the agent had to actually wave Bartender B down for another Miller Light Bottle.This agent had been told that the special of the night was $2 Miller Bottles by Bartender A.This agent paid with a $5 and was given $1 in change.Consequently, Bartender A was waived down and asked if the special was off at that time or had expired.She replied that it was all night.The agent noted the deficit and she immediately opened the drawer and gave the agent money from the drawer.This might sound like great customer service.However, upon closer inspection it really lends itself to the unmistakable conclusion that she knew there was plenty of extra money in that drawer and in fact things like this happen continually and it was in no way out of the norm.

To further exemplify bartender theft and integrity issues, this agent heard the price on this same bottle of beer quoted to other patrons at $2.50 and $3.00 respectively within a ten minute period.This is strong evidence of buck boosting as well.

In terms of Bartender B, NO SALE deposits were also noted happening on his terminal, which was the far end nearest the kitchen.This agent counted two of them on his drawer that were flagrant.Bartender A was the only bartender on shift for the night that was not seen making NO SALE cash deposits into her drawer.However, many of her drinks were seen coming in from cocktail servers, as she was working the terminal closest to the front door.

Showmanship appears to be something that the bartenders or the managers or both consider very important on this bar.However, they as a group are not very good at it.This agent witness long draw pours from free pour spouts where a good 1-2 count of liquor actually hit the floor.Additionally, one group of three mixed vodka drinks actually drained half a bottle with this showmanship.Bartender C was seen guzzling energy drinks one after another behind the bar in the well, and Bartender B was seen with a huge gallon of water that he was drinking from and storing near the ice well.

Midshift bar drawer audits are an absolute necessity, along with the immediate replacement of all but Bartender A, and this agent believes that she is also complicit, knowing what is going on.Thousands of dollars in combined sales and cost are being lost here.

When the agent and associate approached the bar located at the bottom of the patio bar the agent was quickly greeted by Bartender 1.The agent placed a drink order with Bartender 1 as well as ordered two shots (Please see Food and Beverage Summary for details).Bartender 1 quickly poured the beverage, garnishing the glass with his bare hands, and served the agent, then poured the two shots.

Bartender 1 asked the agent if he wanted to start a tab or pay cash and the agent closed the tab using his credit card.Bartender 1 rang the beverages into the register, swiped the card, and provided the agent with a bill with accurate charges.

Bartender 1 did not serve the associate or the agent with a beverage napkin.

Bartender 1 was noted to scoop the ice from the ice bin using his mixing tin and then guide the ice into the glassware by cupping the ice in his hand and letting it fall against his hand and into the glass.

Bartender 1 was observed drinking an orange drink in short glass with ice.The agent was not sure if the beverage contained alcohol; as the agent did not observed Bartender 1 pour the beverage.The agent did note that Bartender 1 appeared to sip the beverage over the course of the first hour of the evaluation.The agent notes that all employee beverages should be held in enclosed containers with lids, however, that most small beverages typically do not get slowly consumed over the course of an hour.The agent would not be surprised if the drink did contain alcohol.

When the agent was ready for another beverage the agent was again helped by Bartender 1 (Please see Food and Beverage Summary for details).

Bartender 1 quickly served the beverage and listed the price of the drink.The agent performed an integrity test and Bartender 1 passed(Please see Food and Beverage Summary for details).

At 11:38pm Bartender 1 served two shots and a beer to a patron and only charged with patron $10.The patron waved off the change from a twenty-dollar bill provided by Bartender 1 and Bartender 1 put the change in his tip cup.It appeared that it was unspoken but appreciated that Bartender 1 did not charge the patron for all of the beverages served.